My Day as a Lib Dem
Polling day. A rush like no other. The only thing that comes close is a medium-sized scoop of Häagen-Dazs straight from the freezer. Vanilla, of course.
But this is no ordinary polling day — it’s the day we finally kick the Tories out. And because my home constituency of Surrey Heath is dyed-in-the-wool true-blue territory, the choice is between the Conservatives and the Lib Dems. So, just for today, I am as orange as your girlfriend on prom night.
I realise something is different the moment I open my eyes on the 4th of July. I have slept in the precise centre of my bed to minimise the risk of falling out. People say that sleeping with your head between the pillows is uncomfortable and pointless and leads to neck ache, but that is one risk that this daredevil is willing to take.
I head sleepily downstairs for breakfast, my adult-sized Thomas the Tank Engine pyjamas shining in the morning sun. My mum brings me two Weetabix and I separate each of them into six equally-sized pieces with laser-like precision. Then I place a single sultana on each of the 12 pieces, because this is the way that things should be. As I eat one careful mouthful after another, I watch the news on TV and am shocked to see reports of a small West African country torn up by civil war. I’m amazed that after 15 World Bank loans, the country hasn’t been able to get its affairs in order — I hope the 16th loan might change that. I watch in horror as the report shows burly men guarding a concentration camp — in 2024! At least some of those concentration camp guards should be women.
Driving to work, the four-bedroom detached houses of Surrey Heath blur together in a pleasing patchwork of orange and beige. People often find it funny when I tell them I work at the Jaffa Cake factory, but I can’t see anything funny about it. My role is to ensure the relative thickness of jaffa to cake is precisely 1:3. People often ask me whether I’ve ever sneaked a jaffa cake for myself. Of course not.
At lunchtime, I have my head buried in Lamposts Weekly in the office canteen when my coworker Simon comes in, face streaked with tears. He’s a lovely old fella, so I ask him what the matter is.
“They’ve just let me go,” he tells me. “Unbelievable. Thirty years of service, then they fire me for underperforming! They know I’ve got arthritis in my wrist.”
“That’s terrible!” I proclaim. “They can’t do that!”
“Apparently they can,” Simon says miserably. “Apparently it’s in the small print.”
“It’s outrageous,” I say. “Simon, I’m going to start a JustGiving account for you. I’ll get everyone at the factory to donate. We’ll raise money so you can get by until you can find another job.”
“That’s so kind of you,” he says. “But maybe there’s something else you can do. You could petition the bosses to change our contracts. You can make sure it never happens again!”
“Well, I don’t like the sound of that,” I say. My heart is racing right now. “I’m sorry about your horrible situation, Simon, but I don’t think there’s anything I can do. Horrible things happen all the time, and there’s simply no way to ever prevent them.”
It’s always nice to impart some wisdom. I return to my lamp posts.
On the way home, I can’t help but notice how many “Vote Lib Dem” signs there are — even the occasional “Vote Labour”. I could never vote Labour (I’m unable to contemplate societal progress) but I could never vote Tory either (I’m not a bad person), so I know where my vote will go this evening. Things need to change, but I don’t want them to. And that’s why, today, I shall vote Lib Dem.
My local polling station is the remains of a school which collapsed last year due to dodgy cheap concrete. To one side is a block of one-bedroom flats which each cost £1.2 million, and to the other is a river with Chernobyl-esque levels of pollution. Even worse, outside the school, there’s a 15-year-old smoking.
Inside, I dodge a collapsing concrete staircase and a seven-eyed frog from the river that can speak fluent Hindu. At long last, I get my voting form and put a cross in the Lib Dem box. Such a thrill — it reminds me of the time I swore back in 1996. Then it’s time for home and bed. I’m not staying up all night to watch the election — I haven’t stayed up all night since, well, ever, actually — but I’m sure I’ll wake up in a glorious new orange dawn. Finally, we can begin to set things right (note that I said we can, not that we will). We can undo years of Tory damage by implementing more of the policies which led to Tory damage in the first place. As my dear old dad used to say, when a political ideology fails, the only solution is more of the same.
